Ken Watanabe born October 21 1959 is a Japanese stage film and television actor To Englishspeaking audiences he is known for playing tragic hero characters such as General Tadamichi Kuribayashi in Letters from Iwo Jima and Lord Katsumoto Moritsugu in The Last Samurai for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor Among other awards he has won the Japan Academy Prize for Best Actor twice in 2007 for Memories of Tomorrow and in 2010 for Shizumanu Taiyō He is also known for his roles in director Christopher Nolans Hollywood blockbusters Batman Begins and Inception